


A Kitchen Makes A Home

by Shadaras



Category: Star Wars Original Trilogy
Genre: Gen, bickering and bantering, can easily be read as past Han/Lando but that isn't a necessary reading, cooking together, sharing food
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-06
Updated: 2020-09-06
Packaged: 2021-03-06 20:22:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,748
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26234830
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Shadaras/pseuds/Shadaras
Summary: After the Battle of Yavin, Han retreats to theFalcon's little kitchen to cook and grumble about being pressed into service for the Rebellion.
Relationships: Chewbacca & Han Solo, Lando Calrissian & Han Solo, Leia Organa & Luke Skywalker & Han Solo
Comments: 12
Kudos: 27
Collections: Friendship Flash Fall 2020





	A Kitchen Makes A Home

**Author's Note:**

  * For [gloss](https://archiveofourown.org/users/gloss/gifts).



People had started talking about The Battle of Yavin with capital letters as soon as the explosion had faded from sight. Han didn’t know why it wasn’t called “The Defeat of the Death Star” or something else a bit more _practical_ , but he was starting to suspect this Rebel Alliance didn’t know what practical was until it hit them over the head. They held everything together with belief and hope and a crapton of other words that didn’t mean food in your stomach or money in your pocket, and he was mad that those words had worked enough magic on him that he was here anyway.

At least the giant celebration had been good. There had been better food than he’d expected, music clashing wildly as soon as you got far enough from one source of noise for someone else to pick up the sound system instead, and a lot of people who wanted to fawn over him as one of the heroes of the battle. The medal ceremony hadn’t hurt, either.

Then they’d all gotten packed up to leave Yavin IV behind.

Han didn’t know _how_ the Princess had talked him into staying and helping, but she had, and before he’d known to protest he had all of her _things_ piled into the _Falcon_ and also all of Luke’s things, of which there were far fewer. Han had grumbled to Chewie, and Chewie had mocked him for it, so Han had retreated to the little kitchen that Lando had installed one of the times he’d had ownership. Han had made fun of him for it exactly once, before Lando had cooked him a meal spicy enough to bring tears to his eyes and better than any reconstituted meal he’d been able to find.

So Han had set about learning to cook, and Lando had helped when they were in the on-again part of their friendship. By now he was pretty good at it, and it was soothing after a long day of people not listening to him. Besides, the Rebels had given him fresh vegetables, and he wanted to use them while he had the chance.

It had been too long since he’d had the supplies and time to cook for himself, he realised as he started dicing onions. Not since the job for Jabba that had gone so bad. He hadn’t had the money or time for more than packaged food and reheatable sludge, which was _fine_ and more filling than a lot of his childhood fare, but—

Han scrubbed away onion tears and set a tall-edged pan on the burner. Potatoes and tomatoes, next. He still had a lot of spices, and they were on-planet so water was easy enough to acquire, for which he was thankful. He hadn’t been thinking about what to cook, but curries were simple and filling and if he was going to be flying with a princess and a farmboy he’d probably end up feeding them too. Han sighed, shook his head, and asked himself, “When did _I_ become responsible for anything?”

Nobody answered, and Han went back to his cutting board.

Chewie ambled into the kitchen as Han set the potatoes to cooking—steaming more than frying; he wanted them soft faster than frying would manage, but he knew himself well enough that if it wasn’t at least _sort of_ frying he’d burn them outright—and growled, “We’ve got local meat.”

“Do we?” Han looked up from very intently watching the potatoes. “I didn’t know that.”

“You’ve been partying while I did all the work.” Chewie didn’t fit into the kitchen as well as either of them would like, but Han hadn’t had the money and time to refit it for a Wookiee at any time since Lando had put the kitchen in to begin with. Despite the constraints, Chewie had figured out how to make it work, and he delicately reached past Han’s head to a cold storage cabinet. “I know you don’t _need_ it…”

Han slapped Chewie’s arm irritably. “Go ahead, you walking carpet; just don’t get your fur in the food.”

Chewie laughed, a roar that Han knew from experience echoed through the whole ship, and picked up a new knife with nimble fingers. He had the strength to slice through the frozen meat—and Han knew Chewie kept the knives sharp enough to do it, because Han had never mastered how to get a good edge on a knife even though it had often been important to his continued survival—and the precision to make the slices fine enough that Han wasn’t worried about how long it’d take to cook.

By the time Chewie finished cutting the meat, the potatoes were soft enough that Han had added in the onions and tomatoes, as well as the brassica and carrots Chewie had meaningfully pushed towards him. “I _do_ know how to feed myself,” Han grumbled as he stirred it all together, adding spices according to what his nose liked. “Just because you grew up cooking with your family and I didn’t doesn’t mean I’m hopeless.”

Chewie slid long thin strips of meat, which bent even before the heat finished thawing them, into the pan. “You’re not hopeless, you’re just forgetful.”

“And you’re a meddling busy-body,” Han said, poking the meat underneath the already-heated vegetables so it would cook faster. “I can finish this myself.”

Dishes clattered into the sink, and Han heard the sonic buzz begin sanitizing the inorganic boards and knives. It was as effective a rebuttal as any words would have been, and Han scowled at the slowly-thickening sauce. Then Chewie said, “You’re only this grumpy about people you like.”

“I am not,” Han said automatically.

“Lando,” Chewie said instantly. “Qi’ra.”

Han turned and stabbed his stirring-spoon at Chewie, forgetting that he’d be flicking hot sauce along with his motion. “You take that back.”

The sauce landed on Chewie’s fur. Chewie looked down at it, then back up at Han, and shook his head. “You’re hopeless,” he said. “I’m going to clean this off before it stains.”

“Nobody would even notice!” Han yelled after him. “It’s not that different a color from your fur!”

“I’d notice!” Chewie shouted back, and then the door to the refresher slammed shut.

Han scowled at the curry, stabbing it viciously and ineffectively with the spoon. It wouldn’t cook any faster just because he was frustrated, and he knew that. Instead, he added a little more water and turned the heat down to let it simmer. Making any kind of bread had always been beyond him, and most other grains required soaking more water than he liked using, so he only rarely had stores that weren’t pre-made. Whatever. He didn’t need everything fresh-cooked, even though Lando would have filled the ship with the scent of yeast and flour and fry-bread to accompany a curry hot enough to make them both cry.

This wasn’t helping, and the meat had cooked, so Han shoved those thoughts away and tasted the curry. As his nose had thought, it was good, and while he’d add more spicy heat if he didn’t suspect that his passengers would be eating some of it, he didn’t know if either Luke or Leia had mouths of steel the way he and Chewie did.

He left the food to simmer while he dug through cabinets to find some easily-reconstituted bread. It was generic, tasted like nothing in particular, but it was filling and good for mopping up the last bits of sauce.

As Han found where he’d stuffed it (behind protein bars and meal sludge), footsteps and bright chattering voices drifted through the corridors. He couldn’t make out the words at first, but he could tell they were heading towards him. Awkwardly, Han tried to arrange himself in the kitchen so that he looked busy. This mostly involved making sure the bread was puffing back up into a bread shape in its packages and picking back up his stirring spoon.

“Han!” Luke cried, entering the kitchen. “I didn’t know you could cook.”

“What of it, kid?” Han prodded the curry one last time and then gave up, turning the heat off with a _click_. “It’s hard to cook when you don’t have anything _to_ cook.”

Leia, meanwhile, had come close enough to look at the shallow pot. Tall pan. Whatever. “When did you learn?” she asked, which was much nicer than Han had expected.

He shrugged and barely managed to remember he was still holding the stirring spoon before he would have scratched his head. “Once there was a kitchen on the _Falcon_ , I kind of had to learn.”

“It wasn’t here when you got her?” Luke grabbed bowls out of a cabinet, which— Yeah, Han had expected him to want some, but had at least expected him to _ask_ first.

“Yeah, yeah, you can try it.” Han didn’t toss the stirring spoon back in, but only because he didn’t want to spash Leia. “Yeah, the _Falcon_ keeps getting upgrades whenever someone’s willing to pay for it. Kitchen was one of the earlier ones, once she became a home and not just a transport.”

Leia leaned against the counter as Luke began ladling curry into the bowls; one for each of them and another for Chewie, even though he wasn’t there. “Thank you for the hospitality,” she said, in such a sweet and princessy way that Han felt his ears turn red. That hadn’t been his reason, but he sure wasn’t going to protest her thinking it was. “It sounds like there’s a story behind the kitchen.”

“Yeah,” Han said, thinking of Lando getting fed up with him and stealing the _Falcon_ out from under his sleeping ass. “There sure is.”

“Will you tell us?” Luke asked, hopping up on the countertop and smiling, bright as the Tatooine suns.

Han sighed, and rolled his eyes, and knew that both the kids could see how it was just bluster. “Fine, but if I’m talking while I’m eating then we are _not_ doing this in the kitchen! There are better places to sit!”

Luke laughed easily, and even Leia smiled as they trooped out of the kitchen, food in hand. Han followed, wondering uneasily when _he’d_ started becoming the responsible one.

Probably, he realised as he started telling the story, when Lando had stopped coming around.

(Later, Chewie informed him that _Chewbacca_ was definitely the most responsible person on the ship, and Han couldn’t find any good way to disagree.)


End file.
